


Mrs. Potato Head

by KoroMarimo



Category: Hellsing
Genre: Based on a Melanie Martinez Song, Disfigurement, F/F, Lesbian Character, Lesbian Vampires, Melanie Martinez References, Mrs. Potato Head - Freeform, Mutual Pining, Nazis, No Lesbians Die, One-Sided Attraction, Vampires, Where are the gays, crybaby, here they are, plastic surgery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-03
Updated: 2018-05-03
Packaged: 2019-05-01 13:40:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14521782
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KoroMarimo/pseuds/KoroMarimo
Summary: (Taken down because of drama concerning the title, reuploaded because I don't give a damn and it was a gift for a lovely friend. Also took some time to rework and update it.)Pain is beauty. A pretty face always makes it better, except when that pretty face happens to be the same tired façade that men fall all over themselves for. You were tired of the attention, your victory being a shallow one at the expense of such a beautiful girl.It took you a while to understand.





	Mrs. Potato Head

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AmputeeTrainee](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AmputeeTrainee/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Forever in a Glass Darkly](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4424693) by [AmputeeTrainee](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AmputeeTrainee/pseuds/AmputeeTrainee). 



> Got into some IRL drama regarding the story and was harassed until I took it down, but I had to bring it back because it was a gift for a good friend and I hope they forgive me for the temp take down.
> 
> Go read everything ever by AmputeeTrainee. Do it now.

Rip Van Winkle’s howling pierced through the zeppelin like an alarm at midnight. She’d been a vampire precisely forty eight hours post-surgery and still wailed like a newborn, you knew the time down to the seconds because you’d been keeping a close eye since the incident. The King of Vampires had taken it out of her after he and his child assistant laid waste to Doctor’s stronghold. Six of you had managed to evacuate; the only casualty was Rip Van Winkle. She had taken a severe blow to the head, and it seemed as though she didn’t appreciate her new face and teeth, nor did she seem at all understanding of the fact that she wasn’t to be a conventional beauty anymore. She was a weapon, and the only person sensitive to her plight was you.

“Go on and tend to her whining.” Doctor complained, “I’ve had just about enough of her.”

“Jawohl.”

And you would do so every night, giving her sedatives and changing her bandages like a mother while she screamed obscenities at you. Lamenting the fact that you were now the only beauty in Millennium whereas before she’d been coveted by hundreds, apparently Doctor’s new faces didn’t come with any sort of a warranty. She claimed that you had personally been the reason for her malformed face that wrinkled in the oddest places now that the surgery had been performed, her freckles the only remaining aspect of her youthful visage. You bore the brunt of this abuse, wondering each time if she knew what was under all the foundation and rouge you caked onto your face to maintain such a pleasant countenance.

“You bitch!” she wailed, “Bumbling cunt! Whore! You wanted them all to yourself didn’t you?! Major won’t look me in the face anymore and it’s your fault!”

Once you told her that you couldn’t hold a scalpel to save your life, so it would have been impossible to deface her personally.

She nearly smashed your skull in. Now whenever she started screaming and crying you knew to keep your mouth shut.

Your hair was kept long, and dramatically curled on one side to hide what the makeup couldn’t. Doctor had fixed you up the best he could, but burned skin didn’t heal with the prototype chip you’d been given. He’d been unsure of updating it considering you were his only assistant left. Suppose something were to go wrong? You were the best he’d had so far. You worked well under pressure, learned any and all procedures in the event of an emergency, where would he be if he lost you on the table? It would be a fool’s errand to come crying to him as though he specialized in plastic surgery. A foolish thing to want a hundred thousand dollars’ worth of compliments, not to mention a waste of precious time and resources.

So you remained with the prototype, able to live a long lasting life and heal to a point, but the scars still remained. Before the operation you’d struggled to keep up your beauty in the eyes of the Doctor and Major once Rip Van Winkle came along. Nights were spent crying and hiding from the world in your sheets when you needed to clean up the makeup from the night before. Sometimes you let it cake on, earning curious glances from your commanding officers while Rip laughed at you from their arms. They never saw you as anything more than a grotesque genius. Each time you picked up your foundation you wondered: when will it be enough? Dear God… When would they think you were beautiful? Sometimes the only inviting aspect seemed to be tying your leather belt into a noose and hanging from the rafters.

Now that the raven haired beauty was maimed, they naturally gravitated to you. Thankful for a pretty face to soothe the disgust and shock when they first removed Rip Van Winkle’s bandages. Both men vied for your affection. Occasionally they fought like schoolboys over who would spend time with you, or who would sit next to you in the new Mercedes or Kübelwagen when the three of you had business to attend. Doctor infuriated you one night before you went to go check on the deranged woman. For some reason he’d taken the liberty of cupping your face in his hands and lifting you up to the light.

“Beautiful.” he exclaimed. “Like a refreshing beam of moonlight. Nothing quite like a pretty face to make it better, isn’t it so my dear?”

Did a pretty face make it better?

Major kept you with him during your free time. Laughing at all your feeble attempts at a joke, as though he’d never heard a comedian like you before. He’d praised you for any insignificant thing you did: cooking him dinner earned a standing ovation, repairing him earned the occasional kiss, a smile was exchanged for his hand on your rump.

“If I did not have my war to tend to, I’d ask you to marry me.” Major had said, only half joking.

But if he held true to that promise, was he really willing to stay forever? Even if your face became like hers, and didn’t stay together…?

In the mirrored medical supply closet you contemplated your face for a long time. Before the burns, before the war, you used to be so carefree. Now you were vapid, shallow, competing for looks and men with a woman who was no more than a shrieking broken mess because Doctor had saved her life. She was lucky to still stand mentally competent. You were there with the Doctor when he pieced her back together with meticulous care, cringing as he was laughing the whole time about how fragile this pathetic excuse of a soldier was. You’d never forget the sight of her skin as it was peeled back, and the deep groves on the crown of her skull became visible. Teeth were missing, too numerous to ignore, and you’d cried when Doctor yanked them out with a rusted pair of pliers and a sarcastic laugh. A new set he’d made only recently had laid on the table. Everything including the canines were filed down to points, easier access to the body for eating he’d claimed. You thought he was mocking her with what he intended to do to repair her once the chip took effect.

“No one will love you if you’re unattractive my dear.” he’d laughed at the half dead body on the table. “What say we give you a new smile?”

No one will love you if you’re unattractive…

“They don’t love you.” you’d scream at the mirror in your room. “You’re nothing more than an ugly bitch and they’ll never love you!”

You raised a gloved hand to your mouth. Pressed your lips against your fingers, and then dragged downwards. The ombre ruby color that made your lips glisten- courtesy of a pilfered Tangee in Burgundy along with some Vaseline Doctor had squirreled away in his workspace- bled down to your chin. Grafted skin on your lips, now stained a bright pink, now looked malformed and swollen. Ironically you’d become a gifted artist, able to conceal everything down to the contours of your nose to make it look as though Doctor was a gifted plastic surgeon. Pucker up your lips, swab a bit of concealer, and you could have been a silver screen actress. Potatoes always have the capacity to become French fries after all… It’s common sense.

Your face felt weighted down and heavy once the makeup bled onto the foundation of your chin. A hand swiped at your cheek. Artificial rosy pink rouge stained your gloves and the cuffs of your tunic. Hair was pulled back and twisted into place. A quick trip to the bathroom and the splashing of water made the buttons on your uniform glisten. With a wet hand you smoothed down any stray hairs that stood on end, looking at yourself for a very long time before coming to a resolve.

“No one will love you if you’re unattractive.” you whispered to your reflection.

The soldier in the mirror didn’t seem to mind. She blinked back serenely, saying in her own quiet way that she’d stay forever even if you didn’t keep it together. No one would love you, but she would. Even if in the end of the war she was all you had left.

When at last you were free, you knew you were ready to face _her_ for one more night.

You entered her room at a quarter to four in the morning with breakfast and a change of bandages. Rip Van Winkle was poised to throw her belongings at you from her cot, when suddenly she stopped. Her face contorted into nothing short of horror and disgust, and her scream turned into a strangled squeal. Two tight braids kept your hair out of your face instead of the dramatic curls you hid behind every night. Instead of your usual cakey façade your face was bare, a large portion of the left side pockmarked and veined with your eye nearly popping out of its socket, for it had no upper or lower lid to keep it intact. Your lips were no longer a glistening blood red, rather they were the same color as the soles of your feet, and the top lip was bulged out in a lighter color than the bottom.

“Good evening.” you said pleasantly as she sat mute. “You look a picture this night.”

She put up no struggle while you changed her bandages and took care to clean her face and body with a damp cloth. Before she would have hurt you, threatened to kill you or take a chunk out of your arm, but you sponged her clean and washed her hair as gently as you could. You waited patiently for her to question your visage, fully prepared to meet her inquiries as to how you’d gone in the span of one night from quaffed and primped to Frankenstein’s monster.

A question never came. She was too frightened to say anything. Rip Van Winkle suckled the plastic of a blood pack obediently when you offered it to her. Like a mother you wiped her face clean when she finished supper and made her room tidy. Complements about her progress and the cleanliness of her sutures fluttered around her head like butterflies, but she still didn’t say anything. She only watched you carefully, like you were a rabid animal poised to bite.

Yet before you left you intended to let her know what this whole thing was about.

“If you think I am a natural beauty, you’re wrong.” You told her nonchalantly as you gathered the used gauze to toss away. “The war is what made me into this disfigured creature you see before you, by my own hand I strive every day to hide it from everyone, even you.”

Nothing. She shook slightly.

“Major knows about it, and of course the Doctor.” you continued, pointing ruefully to your bulging eye which had started to water. “Major is the one who pulled me out of the wreckage. The entire left half of my face and body was smoldering. I had burns beyond third degree, and nearly went blind. I’m very lucky I can hide the rest of my body underneath a tunic and nylons. They had to heal the bones with a chip- in fact it’s here, directly implanted onto the bone.”

You rubbed your cheek where a square lump sat placidly underneath the dermis.

“It was a prototype. I’m one of the first F.R.E.A.K. vampires, but unfortunately being as I’ve got a prototype I can’t do much except heal normally and live for a long period of time without growing old. Doctor was so kind… He tried doing everything he could, but he’d not had any experience in facial reconstruction at that time. He didn’t want to maim me worse than I already was, so he left me this way. I suppose he’s grown so used to seeing me like this he doesn’t want to put me under such pains to reconstruct it now, otherwise he just wants me to remain ugly.”

“I…”

“You’re very lucky you know.” you murmured. “He’s improved a great deal and you got to have the first taste of it. If you’d been hurt at the same time I was, he’d have left you for dead. You’re fortunate to be alive and beautiful.”

From where you stood you could hear her heart going mad, pounding against her chest like a man buried alive and beating on the wood of his own coffin. You were looking directly at her, and you watched her pallor turn a miraculous pink color. Did you still have that capacity as well? You weren’t sure, probably not considering the circumstances… Yet it still made her all the more lovely in the tint of your rose colored lens.

“Beautiful?” she managed breathlessly.

“Yes. You do have someone who thinks you are.”

Gently, just as the doctor did with you, you cupped Rip Van Winkle’s face in your hands and stroked her cheeks with your thumbs, lifting her up to the light to get a better look. Cornflower blue eyes reflected stars, dribbling tears at the corners. You could see yourself reflected in her eyes, pupils dilating as you leaned down. For a moment you shared breath, and then your scarred lips captured hers in a soft, passionate kiss.

She flinched. You pulled away from her and gave a crooked smile, the most you could manage amidst the nerve damage that was prevalent throughout your face. Her face was ruddy with tears streaming down her cheeks to comingle with the mucus.

You thought perhaps she was going to begin screaming again and steeled yourself for the onslaught, caught completely off guard when she pulled you back. Her thin hands wandered the rough wool of your tunic, traveling downwards towards your thighs where she caressed the skin through nylon. Her kiss made you quiver, igniting a fiery passion between your legs and making you sigh in content.

She pulled away, biting the skin of your neck and leaving a trail of bruises as she suckled the skin like a blood pack. Although you could not feel the heat of her lips or the sharpness of her teeth as she left a trail of hickeys, you knew she understood.

You’d stay forever, that much you knew.


End file.
